ve and a sense of duty.

Whether the time has ever arrived in any single country for such a
transformation of politics, such a religious consecration of the forms
of public life, is quite another question. That it did not exist in the
days of Christ, that the seed was then only planted in the earth, to
spring up afterward, when watered by the noblest blood, he himself has
acknowledged and declared; but that the hour will yet come, when the
grain of mustard-seed will grow up into a great tree and overshadow all
the earth with its branches, he has also proclaimed; and happy the
rulers, happy the law-givers, who have power to understand their great
mission in the light of true Christianity. Why was the first appearance
of the Reformers hailed with such universal joy, their annunciation of
the Gospel with such hosannas, by the people? Because the presentiment
had been awakened in millions of hearts that the day of freedom was
dawning and the hour of their deliverance from spiritual and corporeal
bondage had arrived. But what could liberty do for minors, who had been
neglected for centuries, for the uneducated, for congregations without
schools and incapable of comprehending the better religious
instruction, which made but slow progress from the lack of qualified
teachers? Fanatics, like the leaders of the Anabaptists, took hold of
their excited minds and caused Luther and Zwingli to tremble at the
consequences of their own boldness. The bands which were loosened, were
partly drawn tighter again by Luther in monarchical Germany, in that he
adhered the firmer to belief upon authority[2], and by Zwingli in
republican Switzerland, in that, from the man of the people, he became
the man of the government. Moreover the necessary enthusiasm among the
people died away, till an hour of later trial, and it became an easier
thing for the active enemies of the Reformation to awaken repentance in
some, produce indifference in others, and win over individuals by means
of promises. To the subjects of the abbot they used language like this:
"What do you gain by casting off allegiance to your former sovereign,
when you only get a severer one in his stead? Far more seldom does an
ecclesiastical government call out its people to war; it gives a more
efficient support to the poor; it does not lessen, nay rather increases
the number of holidays; preaches no austere and gloomy morality; is
patient and long-suffering, provided only no attack be mad